The Agrarian Programme of Social-Democracy in the First Russian Revolution, 1905-1907

6. Two lines Of Agrarian Programmes in the Revolution

Ifwe now compare the agrarian programmes put forward by the different classes
in the course of the revolution with the economic basis outlined above, we shall
at once perceive two lines in these programmes, corresponding to the two types
of agrarian evolution which we have indicated.

Letus take the Stolypin programme, which is supported by the Right landlords
and the Octobrists. It is avowedly a landlords’ programme. But can it be said
that it is reactionary in the economic sense, i. e., that it precludes, or seeks
to preclude, the development of capitalism, to prevent a bourgeois agrarian
evolution? Not at all. On the contrary, the famous agrarian legislation
introduced by Stolypin under Article 87 is permeated through and through with
the purely bourgeois spirit. There can be no doubt that it. follows the line of
capitalist evolution, facilitates and pushes forward that evolution, hastens the
expropriation of the peasantry, the break-up of the village commune, and the
creation of a peasant bourgeoisie. Without a doubt, that legislation is
progressive in the scientific-economic sense.

Butdoes that mean that Social-Democrats should “sup port” it? It
does not. Only vulgar Marxism can reason in that way, a Marxism whose seeds
Plekhanov and the Mensheviks are so persistently sowing when they sing, shout,
plead, and proclaim: we must support the bourgeoisie in its struggle against the
old order of things. No. To facilitate the development of the productive forces
(this highest criterion of social progress) we must support not bourgeois
evolution of the landlord type, but bourgeois evolution of the peasant type. The
former implies the utmost preservation of bondage and serfdom (remodelled on
bourgeois lines), the least rapid development of the productive forces, and the
retarded development of capitalism; it implies infinitely greater misery and
suffering, exploitation and oppression for the broad mass of the peasantry and,
consequently, also for the proletariat. The second type implies the most rapid
development of the productive forces andthe best possible (under commodity production) conditions of existence for
the mass of the peasantry. The tactics of Social-Democracy in the Russian
bourgeois revolution are determined not by the task of supporting the
liberal bourgeoisie, as the opportunists think, but by the task of
supporting. the fighting peasantry.

Letus take the programme of the liberal bourgeoisie, 1. e., the Cadet
programme. True to the motto: “at your service” (i. e., at the
service of the landlords), they proposed one programme in the First Duma
and another in the Second. They can change their programme as easily and
imperceptibly as all the European unprincipled bourgeois careerists do. In
the First Duma the revolution appeared to be strong, and so the liberal
programme borrowed from it a bit of nationalisation (the “state land
available for distribution”). In the Second Duma the
counter-revolution appeared to be strong, and so the liberal programme
threw the state land available for distribution overboard, swung round to
the Stolypin idea of stable peasant property, strengthened and enlarged the
scope of exemptions from the general rule of compulsory alienation of the
landlords’ land. But we note this two-faced attitude of the liberals only
in passing. The important thing to note here is some thing else, viz., the
principle which iscommon to both“faces” of
the liberal agrarian programme. That common principle consists of:

(1) redemption payments;

(2) preservation of the landlords’ estates;

(3) preservation of the landlords’ privileges when carrying out the reform.

Redemptionpayment is tribute imposed upon social development, tribute
paid to the owners of the feudal latifundia. Redemption payment is tile
realisation, ensured by bureaucratic, police measures, of the feudal
methods of exploitation in the shape of the bourgeois “universal
equivalent”. Further, preservation of the landlords’ estates is seenin one or anotherdegree in both Cadet programmes, no matter how
the bourgeois politicians may try to conceal that fact from the people. The
third point—the preservation of the landlords’ privileges when
carrying out the reform—is quite definitely expressed in the Cadets’
attitude to the election of local land committees on the basis of
universal, direct, and equal suffrage by secret ballot.We cannot here go into

			       details[1]which concern another part of our argument. All we need do here is to
define thelineof the Cadet agrarian programme. And in this
connection we must say that the question of the composition of the local
land committees is ofcardinalimportance. Only political infants
could be taken in by the sound of the Cadet slogan of“compulsoryalienation”. The question is, who will
compel whom? Will the landlords compel the peasants (to pay an exorbitant
price for inferior land), or will the peasants compel the landlords? The
Cadet talk “about equal representation of the conflicting
interests” and about the undesirability of “one-sided
violence” reveals as clear as clear can be the essence of the matter,
namely, that the Cadet idea of compulsory alienation means that the land
lords will compel the peasants!

TheCadet agrarian programme follows the line of Stolypin progress,
i. e., landlord bourgeois progress. That is a fact. Failure to appreciate
this fact is the fundamental mistake made by those Social-Democrats who,
like some ofthe Mensheviks, regard the Cadet agrarian policy as being more progressive
than the Narodnik policy.

Asfor the spokesmen of the peasantry, i. e., the Trudoviks, the
Social-Narodniks, and partly the Socialist-Revolutionaries, we find that,in spite ofconsiderable vacillation and wavering, they, in both
Dumas, adopted a very clear line of defending the interests of the
peasantry against the landlords. For instance, vacillation is observed in
the programme of the Trudoviks on the question of redemption payments, but,
in the first place, they frequently interpret that as something in the
nature of public relief for disabled

			      landlords[2];

secondly, in the records of the Second Duma one can find a number of
exceedingly characteristic speeches bypeasants repudiatingredemption payments and proclaiming the slogan: all the land to all the

			       people.[3]On the question of the local land committees—this all-important
question as to who will compel whom—the peasant deputies are the
originators and supporters of the idea of having them elected by universal
suffrage.

Weare not, for the time being, dealing with the content of the
agrarian programmes of the Trudoviks and Socialist-Revolutionaries, on the
one hand, and the Social-Democrats, on the other. We must first of all note
the incontrovertible fact that the agrarian programmes ofallthe
parties and classes which came out openly in the Russian revolution can be
clearly divided intotwobasic types, corresponding to the two
types of bourgeois agrarian evolution. The dividing line between the
“Right” and “Left” agrarian programmes does not run
between the Octobristsand the Cadets, as is frequently and mistakenly assumed by the Mensheviks
(who allow themselves to he taken in by the sound of
“constitutional-democratic” words and substitute analysis of
the respective titles of the parties for a class analysis). The dividing
line runs between the Cadets and the Trudoviks. That line is determined bythe interests of the two principal classesin Russian society
which are fighting for the land, viz., the landlords and the peasantry. The
Cadets stand for the preservation of landlordism and for a civilised,
European, butlandlordbourgeois evolution of agriculture. The
Trudoviks (and the Social-Democratic workers’ deputies), i.e., the
representatives of the peasantry and the representatives of the
proletariat, advocate, apeasantbourgeois evolution of
agriculture.

Astrict distinction must be drawn between the ideological cloak of the
agrarian programmes, their different political details, etc., and the
economic basis of those programmes. The present difficulty does not lie in
understanding the bourgeois character of the agrarian demands and
programmes of both the landlordsand the peasants: that was
already explained by the Marxists before the revolution, and the revolution
has confirmed the correctness of their explanation. The difficulty lies in
understanding fully the basis of the struggle between the two classeswith in the frameworkof bourgeois society and bourgeois
evolution. The fact that this struggle is a normal social phenomenon will
not be understood unless it is seen as part and parcel of the objective
tendencies of the economic development of capitalist Russia.

Now,having shown the connection between the two types of agrarian
programmes in the Russian revolution and the two types of bourgeois
agrarian evolution, we must pass on to the examination of a new, extremely
important aspect of the question.

[1]Seethe records of the First Duma, 14th sitting, May 24, 1906, which
show that the Cadets Kokoshkin and Kotlyarevsky, hand in hand with the
(then) Octobrist Heyden, resorted to the basest sophistry to repudiate the
idea of local land committees. In the Second Duma:

the evasions by the Cadet Savelyev (16th sitting. March 26, 1907) and the
open opposition to the idea of local committees by the Cadet Tatarinov
(24th sitting, April 9,1907, p. 1783 of Stenographic Record). The newspaperRech, No. 82, for May 25, 1906. contained a noteworthy leading
article which is reprinted in Milyukov’sA Year of Struggle,
No. 117, pp. 457-59. Here is the decisive passage from this Octobrist in
disguise: “We believe that setting up these commit tees on the basis of
universal suffrage would mean preparing them not for the peaceful solution
of the land problem in the local areas, but for something entirely
different. Control of the general direction of the reform ought to be left
in the hands of the state.... The local commissions should consist as
equally as possible [sic!] of representatives of the conflicting
interests which can be reconciled without impairing the state importance of
the proposed reform, and without turning it into an act of one-sided
violence”... (p. 459). In the CadetAgrarian Question, Vol. II,
Mr. Kutler published the text of his Bill whichensuresto the
landlords, plus the officials,preponderanceover the peasants inallthe principal, gubernia and uyezd land commissions and
committees (pp. 640-41), while Mr. A. Chuprov—a “liberal”!— defends on
principle the same despicable plan of the landlords to swindle the peasants
(p. 33).  —Lenin

[2]SeeSbornik “Izvestii Krestyanskikh Deputatov” i “Trudovoi
Rossii” (The Symposium of “Peasant Deputies’ News” and “Toiling
Russia”), St. Petersburg, 1906, a collection ofnewspaperarticles by the Trudoviks in the First Duma; for instance, the article
entitled “Grants, Not Redemption Payments” (pp. 44-49), et al.  —Lenin

[3]Seethe speech made by theRight-wingpeasant deputy
Petrochenko in the Second Duma (22nd sitting, April 5, 1907): Kutler, he
said, proposed good conditions.... “Of course, being a wealthy man he has
named a high figure, and we, poor peasants, cannot pay such a price”
(p. 1616). Thus, theRight-wingpeasant ismoreto theleftthan the bourgeois politician who is playing at being a
liberal. See also the speech of thenon-partypeasant deputy
Semyonov (April 12, 1907), which breathes the spirit of the spontaneous
revolutionary struggle of the peasants, and many other speeches.  —Lenin